Chapter 4 Habitats
Priority Conservation Action, Examples of Focal Species or Focal Habitats
• Conduct distributional and status surveys for pelagic and shore birds, small mammals, and reptiles that may use this habitat.
4.4.18.6.2 Monitoring Monitoring involves repeated observation and recording of specific parameters to show trends over time. Long-term monitoring that includes statistical and quantitative analysis in the design is critical to assessing species and ecosystem health and gauging the resilience of organisms to changing conditions (Gitzen et al. 2012, Lindenmayer and Likens 2009) . Monitoring efforts should include identification of population trends, as well as assessment of impacts from conservation or development activities. These efforts will inform species and habitat management decisions. Long-term monitoring sites need to be identified, and monitoring protocols developed for all priority species. Monitoring plans should be coordinated with other existing monitoring programs where feasible. Monitoring of aquatic taxa is critical to assessing species and ecosystem health and gauging the resilience of organisms to a changing climate. These monitoring efforts will inform future decisions on how to manage aquatic species. Priority Conservation Action, Examples of Focal Species or Focal Habitats • Develop long-term monitoring to identify population trends and to assess performance of conservation actions. Monitoring plans should be coordinated with other existing monitoring programs where feasible. Use of automated devices such as acoustic recording units and wildlife cameras should be considered. • Design an ecological monitoring system that can measure how the beach ecosystem responds to human pressures particular to the coastline. Use long-term monitoring to measure the changing health of the beach in response to long-term and cumulative pressures (Peterson and Manning 2001) . • Conduct ecological monitoring before, during, and after construction of shoreline hardening structures and beach renourishment projects to best understand the extent to which the beach ecosystem changes. Monitoring should also continue well after project completion to understand long-term effects of this anthropogenic disturbance, as well as cumulative effects of multiple nourishment projects. Scientists should use a scientifically and statistically robust monitoring design that looks at multiple indicators of beach ecosystem health. Analysis of data should include a test of statistical power (Peterson and Manning 2001) .
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2025 NC Wildlife Action Plan
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